Executive Committee Meeting Minutes November 11, 2011

Present:  Ryan Brown, Jan Clark, David dePosada, Ken McGill, Sandra Jordan, Deborah MacMillan, Judith Malachowski, Lyndall Muschell, Amy Pinney, Stas Preczewski, Matt Rogers, Catherine Whelan

Regrets:  Edward Whatley

Absent:  Dianne Chamblee

Call to Order by Jan Clark at 8:02 am

Agenda was read and approved.

President's Report – Dr. Stas Preczewski, Interim President

It is now clear that there will be consolidation of some USG colleges across the state and it appears that this process will be completed by August. This is a Board of Regents and Chancellor initiative and no input is being sought from USG presidents.  Future funding will be tied to graduation and retention rates.  It is anticipated that about 2% of additional funding will be released to use for some of the improvement projects that have begun at GC.

Dr. Preczewski gave a special kudos to music therapy department’s performance last night.  He attended the performance last night and reported that it was amazing what the students had accomplished. He also was pleased to report that he attended the opening of Hamlet.

Provost's Report – Dr. Sandra Jordan, Provost

Invited Mrs. Deal (Governor’s wife).  Early childhood education – Sandy Baxter.

There is a tremendous amount of change that will be up coming.  There is a national agenda to increase the number of students entering college and obtaining some kind of college degree or technical degree.  The CAO meeting discussed how to build greater capacity within the existing system without adding new colleges or new buildings by creatively exploring ways that this could be accomplished online, using alternative class times (i.e., weekends), or other possible approaches. Since the entire core is similar from institution to institution, the benefits of putting the entire core online was discussed.   The idea is to encourage increased simplicity of getting a degree.  This will have some implications for all the institutions in the USG system. The other piece to keep in mind is the new funding plan and the metric that will be used to reward the behaviors that the UGS wants to see exhibited.

It is important for us to remember that the 21 positions that were on soft funding have now been made permanent.  Additionally there are 14 positions that have been created with stimulus funding.  College of Business still has the highest student to faculty ratio. This is a result of an intentional effort to keep the core class size small in keeping with the liberal arts focus.

Dr. Jordan reported that she had a productive meeting with Dr. Andrei Barkovski to discuss the faculty contract history.  The way the original question regarding start and end dates on contracts was brought to Dr. Jordan was to address whether we had changed this or not.  A handout regarding the Contract History Summary was provided to the committee and will be presented at the full Senate at the November 18^th meeting. Dr. Amy Pinney, Chair of Academic Policy Committee will take this information back to her committee and make sure that there are no additional questions.

In response to questions regarding the procedure for changing the online policy manual, Dr. Jordan provided some history regarding the ongoing transition from a hard copy to the still emerging online format. Originally there was a paper loose-leaf notebook that was the policy manual.  Changes to this document were documented using a log. About 2 1/2 years ago prior to Dr. Jordan coming to GC, the hard copy transitioned to an online format.  This task was assigned to Dr. Paul Jones, Vice President. The job was out sourced to a company to be placed on line and it was during this time that multiple written and online documents were brought together (guideline, policy, best practices, and procedures). One problem with the online format that has already been identified is that there is no longer a log to keep track of changes. An entire ECUS meeting will be devoted to addressing some of the issues that have been identified and recommending possible solutions.

Committee Reports 

Executive Committee: Dr. Jan Clark, Chair and Senate President

Faculty Salary Report is now in the library for you to see.  Letters will be going out in the next few weeks.  They will be hand delivered to the Chairs and then given to the faculty that are supposed to receive these.  It is anticipated that it will be before Thanksgiving. The Staff Salary Survey has begun.

Student Affairs Policy Committee: Mrs. Dianne Chamblee, Chair (not submitted)

Resource Planning and Institutional Policy Committee: Dr. Judith Malachowski, Chair

 RPIPC meet on November 4^th, 2011. 

Carol Ward, Interim Director of Human Resources, graciously attended last Friday’s meeting.  PRIPC members shared concerns from their constituencies on the changes to the benefits plan.  Ms. Ward gave a brief update and said that more information will be forthcoming from her office.

Key points:

Additional group information sessions hosted by HR may be scheduled prior to the end of the enrollment period.  All staff and faculty are encouraged to come to the sessions.

The BCBS phone number for questions about in-plan providers is 800-425-9850.

96% of current in-plan providers have negotiated to be part of the 2012 plan.

A representative from BCBS may return to campus this week.

It is possible that additional providers will be added to the 2012 plan.

Suggestions from RPIPC for future enrollment periods:

Lengthen the time to consider new options.  The open enrollment period may be dictated by the BOR.

Host a two-day benefits fair.  The BCBS representative makes the rounds of all USG schools.  It may be difficulty to have someone on campus for two consecutive days.

A bulleted list of major changes from the HR department prior to or at the start of open enrollment period will help focus everyone’s attention.

Receiving the benefits packages prior to the benefits fair may help staff/faculty to identify their questions and concerns.

Harry Battson, Director of University Communications, attended. He provided a handout of the mission and goals of his department and current staff roles.  Discussion focused on the process of verifying the accuracy of content for news items, communication media (including the various list serves), and identification of point-person for communication (send all to Mr. Battson and he will distribute as needed). RPIPC suggested that University Communications publish key points about the services of campus departments.

RPIPC discussed possible additions to the exceptions to the Sponsorship Policy.  The question to ECUS:  what is the process for adding other GC entities to the exemption list?  The two entities mentioned were WRGC and Connections Magazine. 

After discussion with ECUS members, it was decided that RPIPC would make a recommendation to the November Senate meeting, with the endorsement of ECUS.

Tentative agenda for the December 2, 2011 meeting:

Gap analysis report – Carnegie Community Engagement – Mr. Tom Miles, Chair of Task Force

Smoking policy

Service recognition dates

Faculty Affairs Policy Committee - Dr. David DePosada for Dr. Craig Turner, Chair.

FAPC is very interested in clarifying the charges to both Faculty Affairs Policy Committee (FAPC) and Academic Policy Committee (APC).  It was pointed out by Dr. Ken McGill that in the past the function of a number of committees were managed by one committee and that because of workload for the committees in was determine to make the separate committees. Dr. Stas Preczewski recommended that ECUS review the charges for Faculty Affairs Policy Committee (FAPC) and Academic Policy Committee (APC), and Resource Planning and Institutional Policy Committee (RPIPC) and address any questions regarding the charges.

FAPC requested confirmation on the steering of the "start/end dates of academic year faculty contracts" item. This item was confirmed as having been steered to ECUS. 

Academic Policy Committee: Dr. Amy Pinney, Chair

Items for review at the last APC meeting were as follows: 

Steve Elliott Gower came to meeting to address questions about the Honors Options. It was noted that the majority of the questions could be answered by the information provided on the GC web site.

The question was posed regarding the necessity for both the course faculty and the advisor to sign the form for students to withdraw from a course.  Additional concern was expressed over the ability for someone other that the student’s advisor to be able to remove an advisor hold.  APC has asked Ms. Kay Anderson to come to the next meeting to address these questions.

The policy regarding videotaping of a class by students and the need for clarification regarding the initial information received from Mr. Marc Cardinelli. It was recommended that written clarification from Mr. Cardinelli be provided to the faculty and that this communication should also address any restrictions regarding how the student’s could use the recordings (i.e., YouTube etc.).

Curriculum and Assessment Policy Committee: Dr. Ryan Brown, Chair  

New concentrations in existing programs are passed on the USG only as an information item.

To what extent are these reviewed? 

Revision of general education goals.  The number has been reduced from 11 to 4 goals. A forum is planned for next Friday, will be announced pending room availability. Revision of the Q learning outcomes.  Proposal to eliminate the writing and speaking overlays.

ECUS encouraged CAPC to have more than one forum.

Report USG Faculty Council Recommendations – Catherine Whelan, Representative

Dr. Whelan plans to give a more detailed report at the November 18 Senate Meeting about the recommendations coming from the USG Faculty Council.  Dr. Whelan reported that she felt after attending this first meeting that it was important for GC to have continuity of representation on this council. The procedure as it stands right now for the Senate President-Elect to be the USG Faculty Council representative.  Dr. Whelan would like for us to consider a 3-year appointment for this committee.  Additionally she recommends that the representative have a year or two experience in GC governance.

Unfinished Business:

None

New Business:

The proposed dates and times for the ECUS/SCC meetings (spring 2012) were presented by Dr. Jan Clark.  ECUS/SCC members requested that these proposed dates and times be sent out using an electronic scheduling manager like Meeting Wizard.  Matt Rodgers will do this.

Dr. Jordan, Provost brought forward a steering item for ECUS regarding the implementation of December graduation 2012.  The motion was made, seconded, and approved that this be steered to APC.  It was suggested that Dr. Amy Pinney, Chair of APC might want to ask the Committee on Ceremonies and Commencement to advise the process.  Kay Anderson is the chair of that committee.

Information Item: 

The minutes will be recorded by Mr. Matthew Buchanan at the next Senate meeting.

Next meeting of the University Senate November 18, 3:30-4:30, A & S 2-72

Next meeting of Standing Committees:  Friday December 2^nd, various locations

Next meeting of ECUS, Friday December 2, 9 – 10 am, parks 301

Recorded by Deborah MacMillan, Secretary